Wizard Wars and Clare by-election, 1828

Wizard Wars is a reality competition show in which teams of magicians create and perform original magic routines before a live studio audience. Their acts are judged on creativity, deception, and showmanship. Vegas headliners Penn & Teller head up the judging panel, alongside magic critic Christen Gerhart and World Champion of Magic Jason Latimer. Wizard Wars also features four "home team" magicians—the "Wizards"—who return every week to take on new teams of "challengers." Wizards include street magician Justin Flom, stage illusionist David Shimshi, mentalist Angela Funovitz, and con man Gregory Wilson. The series premiered August 19, 2014

Wizard Wars was created in 2012 by Vegas-based magic consultant Rick Lax and street magician Justin Flom. Flom filmed the original Wizard Wars pilot in Lax's apartment, on a $15 budget. The competing magicians created routines with placemats, beach balls, colored erasers and fake oranges. Flom's YouTube video, featured on Wired.com and BoingBoing.com, caught the eye of production company A. Smith & Co., who worked with Lax and Flom to sell the show to the Syfy network. Flom now stars in the show as a "Wizard"; Lax works behind the scene as a producer and magic consultant. Season 1 Wizard Angela Funovitz creating in the 'Magic Workshop.' Also pictured: Series creator Rick Lax (far left) and Wizard/series originator Justin Flom (middle).

Notable magicians appearing on Wizard Wars include Las Vegas headliners Murray SawChuck, Tommy Wind, Chris Randall and Nathan Burton.

Over a million people watched the Wizard Wars series premier. The episode highlighted Canadian illusionists Chris Funk and Ekaterina, who ended up losing the "Wizard War" to "Wizards" Gregory Wilson and Justin Flom.

Speaking on behalf of Flom and himself, Lax said this of the Internet-to-series premier journey: “The most unlikely part of the YouTube-video-to-Syfy-show transition was that the original Wizard Wars vision stayed in shape...Everyone told me, ‘Hollywood is going to tear your idea apart,’ but that didn’t happen. Only thing that happened was the magic got bigger and better.”

Wizard Wars maintained "very solid ratings" and was renewed for another six episodes. In these six episodes ("Season 1.5") former Challenger Billy Kidd joins the the cast as a full-fledged Wizard.

Contents 1 Behind-The-Scenes 2 Episode list 2.1 Season 1 (2014) 3 References

Behind-The-Scenes

In August of 2014 Wired (website) offered viewers a behind-the-scenes look at Season 1 of Wizard Wars.

Episode list Season 1 (2014)

Clare by-election, 1828 and Wizard Wars

Clare was held by William Vesey Fitzgerald when he became the President of the Board of Trade. As this was an seen to be an office of profit, Vesey-FitzGerald had to stand in a by-election.

It was not unusual for these by-elections to be uncontested. However the Catholic Association, a group campaigning for Catholic civil rights and the repeal of the Act of Union, had vowed to oppose every member of the current government, who had declined to allow for Catholic Emancipation. A number of candidates were approached but refused to stand, Vesey-FitzGerald was reasonably popular with Catholics in Clare.

Daniel O'Connell decided to exploit a loop hole in the Act of Union. It stated that Catholics could not sit in Westminster as a Member of Parliament (MP), but there was nothing about them standing for an election.

Like all Parliamentary elections at the time Clare was held as an open vote, which meant that all votes would be known. This meant that Protestant and pro-union landowners could influence their tenants who were far more likely to be Catholic and anti-union.

O'Connell won the by-election. Since he was a Catholic, he could not take the Oath of Supremacy, which was incompatible with Catholicism and so could not take his seat in parliament. This meant that his demand rose to allow him to become an MP for County Clare as it did not have representation. O'Connell hinted that he would get more Catholics elected to force the situation saying "they must crush us or conciliate us".

The Prime Minister, the Duke of Wellington, and the Home Secretary, Sir Robert Peel, even though they opposed Catholic participation in Parliament, saw that denying O'Connell his seat would cause outrage and could lead to another rebellion or uprising in Ireland, which was about 85% Catholic. This led directly to the Catholic Relief Act 1829.
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